Question

Read the following poem by Grace Paley and answer the question that follows. Your response should be 2–3 sentences in length. Family"
My father was brilliant embarrassed funny handsome
my mother was plain serious principled kind
my grandmother was intelligent lonesome for her other life her dead children silent
my aunt was beautiful bitter angry loving
I fell among these adjectives in earliest childhood
and was nearly buried with opportunity some of them stuck to me others finding me American and smooth slipped away.
What does the speaker of the poem imply about being American?

Answer 1

The storyteller of "Family" by Grace Paley utilizes a few descriptive words to depict different relatives, and says a portion of the descriptors adhered to her, while others, "discovering me American and smooth disappeared." This last line proposes that Americans are "smooth," and that descriptive words, or thoughts regarding individuals, can "slip" off them. This appears to imply that Americans are not ready to see past the self-evident; don't look further into a thought.